


in light of recent events

by meathermac



Category: Dimension 20 (Web Series), Fantasy High (Dimension 20)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, M/M, Winky Face, adaine deserves a medal for putting up with these dipshits, cursing, i'm out of things to put here, it's canon divergent for now until fabriz gets confirmed, liberal use of the messenger cantrip, pre-slash (kinda), takes place during s1 ep9, the bad kids - Freeform, the bad kids have feelings too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-01
Updated: 2020-01-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 16:20:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22059982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meathermac/pseuds/meathermac
Summary: “If we get to one-hundred heads before Fig and Riz get back, I think the universe is trying to tell us something,” Gorgug muses as he and Fabian flip their fiftieth head on this stupid coin, and Adaine makes a mental note to make sure the coin turns tails on their 100th flip should they make it.-in which a coin is flipped exactly sixty-five times, adaine rolls a nat 20 on insight, fig and riz have a Talk, and kristen yells some things
Relationships: Riz Gukgak/Fabian Aramais Seacaster
Comments: 12
Kudos: 265





	in light of recent events

**Author's Note:**

> i was inspired by the scene where fabian and gorgug flip a coin sixty-five times and adaine regrets her friendships for a bit. this is kind of just a little scene of what i assumed took place at the hospital during episode 9 when they left fabian, gorgug, and adaine outside, and also what happens when fig and riz are left to their own for a little while. 
> 
> this is not my first fic by any means, but it is my first fantasy high fic and i'm genuinely scared about writing this, but i did my best!!!!! hope you guys enjoy!
> 
> warnings: heavy, heavy cursing, kristen says the f-word 4 times in one sentence

“If we get to one-hundred heads before Fig and Riz get back, I think the universe is trying to tell us something,” Gorgug muses as he and Fabian flip their fiftieth head on this stupid coin, and Adaine makes a mental note to make sure the coin turns tails on their 100th flip should they make it.

“Yeah, probably that you two need to stop flipping that  _ fucking coin _ ,” she grouses, choosing deliberately to ignore the fact that it’s her Mage Hand spell enabling them. 

Fabian snorts rather unceremoniously and watches the coin fall on its fifty-first heads. “By all means, if you have something you’d rather do, go right ahead.” 

“I’ve not got anything to be doing, that’s the problem,” Adaine mumbles as she notices Fabian’s posture, usually perfect--as many things about Fabian are, annoyingly enough, reminds her of her godforsaken sister--but as he flips the coin a fifty-second time, she realizes his shoulders are hunched in and he’s leaning against the wall as if he’s exhausted and he looks… worried? Not as if he’s scared, but a strange look of concern is painted across the usually confident face and it’s  _ freaky _ . 

Gorgug glances up to see Adaine carefully observing Fabian and gives her a strange look. She shrugs and returns to making sure their coin stays at heads, and Gorgug simply shakes his head and goes back to listening to Fabian say something about his father and a coin with three sides. Adaine manages two more flips (fifty-three, heads, fifty-four, heads. She’s at least consistent) of that infernal coin before she breaks and asks, “Fabian, what’s wrong?” 

He snaps up, eyes widening and mouth parting slightly before he gets whatever shock she elicited in him under control and narrows his eyes, glaring at her. “What in the world leads you to believe that something is  _ wrong _ , Adaine?” 

She gestures vaguely at him and Fabian raises an eyebrow because apparently just pointing at him and expecting him to understand isn’t  _ enough _ , but when he continues to just look at her with no real comprehension of her erratic gestures, Adaine sighs heavily and says, “You look worried. I was just wondering if… we could do anything? Gorgug and I?” Gorgug nods enthusiastically at this and Fabian stifles a laugh behind his hand--Gorgug doesn’t really seem to care, she notes, because Fabian is smiling and that’s good enough for them. “I’m sure they’re fine if that’s what you’re concerned about,” Adaine ventures. 

“I don’t care about them,” Fabian mutters, and she fixes him with her best ‘that’s complete bullshit’ stare because at this point they’ve both been through quite a bit of shit to be claiming that they aren’t at least important to each other’s causes if not just to each other. He huffs and folds his arms across his chest petulantly before amending his statement. “It’s not that I don’t care about them, I guess, but… for fuck’s sake, Adaine, am I looking that bad right now?” He runs his fingers through his hair without even fully realizing it--and  _ she  _ realizes that she’s been unconsciously cataloging everything Fabian’s been doing--which means she’s been  _ staring _ at him--and it’s a bit weird. 

“No!” Adaine responds quickly. “No, you look fine. Great, in fact. Holy shit, I made this weird really fast. You look as good as you normally look, just… tired. Worried. It’s fine, I was just saying…” she rambles on helplessly, looking to Gorgug for help. 

Thankfully, Gorgug steps in and says, “Adaine and I are just making sure you’re okay, Fabian. Nothin’ suspicious.” He smiles at Fabian, who wrinkles his nose at Gorgug. “We’re worried about them too, they’ve been gone a long while and that gets a bit scary!” 

“I’m not fucking worried about Riz, so shut  _ up _ !” Fabian exclaims and the genasi couple walking out of the hospital shoot him a dirty look. Adaine and Gorgug share a look that’s floating somewhere in the middle of ‘man, he’s shit at lying’ and ‘oh god, there’s something really deep here and neither of us is emotionally prepared for it’ and both mentally steel themselves for whatever is about to come.

Gorgug mumbles something under his breath to Adaine which vaguely sounds like “roll initiative” before he takes the coin away from Fabian entirely and looks at him with concern. “Just… Riz? Not Fig and Kristen?”

“I--I just made a mistake in my speech, I meant all of them--” 

Adaine furrows her brow. “And--you called him Riz. Not… the Ball? You always call him the Ball.” 

Fabian sputters, shaking his head vigorously while he attempts to form words to no avail. “I--”

She rolls Insight. 

Nat 20. 

Strong, non-platonic feelings towards someone… strong feelings towards  _ Riz,  _ specifically, and all of a sudden it hits her like a tidal wave that Fabian has a  _ crush _ on Riz. 

“ _ Oh. _ Oh.  _ That’s _ what this is about!?” Adaine nothing short of yells that last line and Fabian looks at her with all the rage he can muster (and Gorgug just looks confused). “You--” 

“You better shut up right now, Adaine Abernant, or I will call the Hangman to run you over where you stand,” he growls, and she puts her hands up and backs off as Gorgug desperately tries to catch up on the conversation. 

Adaine nods since she’s fully aware that Fabian will kill her should he find good reason to, but the part of her that feels like she can’t just leave this hanging wins out. “You know it’s nothing to be ashamed of, right?” she says gently, and he reels like what Adaine’s said has hurt him physically. 

“There’s nothing for me to be ashamed of!” Fabian yells, his tone biting. “I don’t know what you think you know, but you don’t know  _ shit _ , Abernant!” He snatches the coin out of Gorgug’s hand and flips it and Adaine almost forgets to make sure it lands on heads. 

“Fabian--” 

He wheels to face her and all of a sudden she’s acutely aware of the fact that Fabian is six-foot-one and ridiculously athletic and that this may not end well for her. “Adaine,” Fabian says slowly, “I don’t know what Insight you think you have on me but I can swear to whatever Kristen’s current god is that it is not true.” 

“So you don’t have a crush on Riz?” she blurts out, and Gorgug’s eyes widen with realization. 

Fabian freezes in place and glances rapidly back and forth between the two of them. “I… I don’t know. I don’t know what that’s supposed to--and I’m not supposed to--I just don’t know, okay?” 

Gorgug sits down and motions for Fabian to do the same, and he does so reluctantly. Adaine joins them on the sidewalk of the hospital as well, hoping that this conversation will take a turn for the better when Gorgug gets involved. He places a hand on Fabian’s shoulder and says comfortingly, “It’s okay to not know things. I don’t know a lot of things.” 

Adaine laughs a bit, and even Fabian cracks a smile at that. He casts his gaze down to a pebble on the ground, which he picks up and rolls between his fingers as he speaks. “It’s really not that I don’t know, it’s more that I don’t know what that means. I--I like him. I am certain of that. But I am not that kind of person.” 

“What kind of person?” she challenges. “The gay kind? Cause if that’s your problem--”

“Hold your horses, Adaine, I’m not saying I’ve got any problem with being gay.” He laughs a little, smiling wryly. “In fact, I think I am gay. Maybe. I like Riz. And… I don’t know. But… thanks. It may be a bit cheesy, but I think forcing me to talk about it helped. So really all I’m trying to say is I’m grateful that you know now and can we please get this awkward conversation over with?” Fabian concludes helplessly with his head tilted to the side, and Adaine can’t help but lean in and hug him. Gorgug follows suit and they sit there hugging for a while (longer than any of them would care to admit) until Fabian decides that they need to finish this quest to one-hundred heads and Adaine was fine to sit back and cast Mage Hand for a while. 

They still think it’s genuinely luck, and Adaine feels like she’s closer with Fabian and Gorgug than she was, and so she doesn’t really even think about it before flipping the coin to heads and watching Gorgug’s face light up in confusion as Fabian laughs bitterly. 

They’ll be fine. 

\--

“What the  _ hell _ was that?” Riz whisper-shouts as he and Fig walk down the halls of the hospital as quickly as possible. 

Fig smirks and shrugs. “My first kiss.” 

“What the  _ fuck,  _ Fig, that was a grown-ass man, never mind the fact that he was hot as all hell--”

She gasps, cutting him off. “You thought he was hot too?” 

Riz shrugs. “I’m not blind,” he mumbles, keeping his head down as they walk through the hallways. He’s not, in fact, blind, but he’s learning that he’s kind of oblivious and that’s becoming a solid problem in his life. He’s also learning that he looks at guys more than he looks at girls if he’s even looking at girls at all. Most of all, Riz has recently learned that he really enjoys being close to Fabian and he’s not so sure how to feel about that. 

You try getting bridal-carried by an attractive half-elf and not having a gay awakening after it.

“So are you like, into guys?” Fig asks nonchalantly, and Riz chokes on an imaginary drink. 

He sputters, glaring at her with all the might he can gather (Fig just laughs). “Does it  _ matter _ ?” 

“Well, no, but also like, you know I don’t care, right?” She shoots him a lopsided smile. “Doesn’t matter so long as you’re not dead and stuff.” 

“Eloquent.” 

Fig shoves him and Riz laughs. “Shut the hell up, Riz. I seem to remember one of us just performing a life-saving procedure not ten minutes ago, so show some respect.”

“Yeah! That was me performing the life-saving procedure, you absolute piece of  _ shit-- _ ” 

She shoves him again, harder this time, and Riz falls to the ground as Fig bursts into laughter. He glares at her while he stands up and the other nurses and doctors roaming the halls give them both dirty looks and Riz can even hear one of them mumble “Dr. Keller, don’t be like this” as they walk past. 

“Sorry,” Fig says, definitely not sorry, and pats Riz on the shoulder. “So.” 

“So what?” he prompts, and she rolls her eyes. 

“So like, are you gay or what?” she asks yet again. 

Riz stops short in the hall and bites his lip, trying desperately not to scream at Fig right now. She means well, ‘cause she’s Fig and she’s just doing Fig things, but there are more important things than sexuality at a time like this. 

Fig snorts and looks at him sideways. “Kristen’s whole thing is partially ‘cause of a sexuality crisis. Can’t see why any more of us can’t be having revelations about our preferences.” 

“Are you--did you cast Detect Thoughts on me?” Riz crosses his arms and fixes Fig with the most disappointed stare he can manage. “Fig.” 

“I was just tryin’ ta figure out whether or not you’d done something stupid or I’d done something stupid to make ya mad,” she says rather unabashedly. “So far I haven’t seen anything.” 

Riz nods slightly and moves to continue walking before he remembers what he’d been thinking about before she shoved him. “Hey, Fig…” 

“You wanna know how long I’ve been listening to your thoughts?” Fig smirks. 

“Well, yes--” 

She raises her eyebrows. “Riz, for as smart a little guy as yourself is, you’d really think you’d have figured out by now that when you think about the thing you’re trying to find out if I knew about means that I heard it, huh?”

Riz closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. “So basically what I’m hearing is that you’ve learned two of my most closely guarded secrets in the span of two minutes?” 

Fig giggles. “Yep! And I got to kiss a hot doctor and save someone’s life!” she replies, and she and Riz start off down the hallway again with Riz mumbling “I saved someone’s life and you took the credit for it” all the way to Biz’s room. 

He forgets about Fig’s new knowledge while they interrogate Biz, and it’s only when she sidles up to him after they leave the room and says, “Fabian, huh?” that he realizes just how much this is going to ruin his life. 

“I mean, yeah,” he says, twisting his hands a bit. “It’s just… I dunno, it’s been a really long day already, Fig, I don’t wanna talk about it right now.” 

She shrugs, apparently accepting that as good enough reason, and opens the door to the parking lot of the hospital where Gorgug and Fabian flip their sixty-fifth heads and Adaine watches in amusement. When Adaine sees Fig, her eyes light up and she casts something Riz can’t see, but he assumes it’s Messenger because Fig stares at something in front of her before bursting into laughter. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she mutters and sends a message back to Adaine, who laughs as well. 

Gorgug and Fabian are still chatting aimlessly as they flip the coin, and when they see Riz Gorgug grins and waves hello and Fabian just smiles a little and gives him a quick nod. “Hello, the Ball, I see you and Fig have made it back alright?” 

Riz blushes a little despite himself and replies “Yeah, we’re all good. Don’t go worrying about me, Fabian.” 

“I promise I won’t,” he says, smooth as ever, and Riz laughs. Gorgug watches them like a tennis match, smiling from ear to ear and trying to make it not obvious--which consequentially makes it extremely obvious. Riz gives him a strange look and turns back to Adaine and Fig. 

“Where’s Kristen?” he asks, and as his back is turned Fabian whacks Gorgug on the arm and the half-orc frowns and rubs his shoulder. 

Adaine wrinkles her nose a bit. “She’ll be here soon.” 

True to Adaine’s word, Kristen storms out of the building ten seconds later looking frazzled as all hell. She stops in front of the group of them and sighs heavily before saying, “Alright, so apparently I grew up in a  _ fucking _ cult, and I’m gonna give you all a  _ fucking _ inspirational speech and it’s going to be  _ fucking _ good.

“Guess what? Life is dumb and my parents are radical cultists! I think I might be gay and I think my parents are part of a much larger scheme that’s going on here and I think that we’re all  _ fucked _ . But you know what?” she asks, laughing, “Everything’s gonna be alright because somehow I came back from the dead once! And I’ve brought a bunch of people back from the dead! God doesn’t exist and life is a motherfucking mistake, y’all, so hand me some of that vodka cause apparently I’m in a cult!” 

Adaine shoots Fig a death glare as she holds out the vodka and pats Kristen on the shoulder comfortingly. “How about we head out, Kris?” she says gently, and the rest of the group voices their agreement. 

Kristen laughs--almost maniacally--and gestures to Riz and Fabian. “Only if I can talk to these dipshits on the way about hidden sexuality because apparently, I’m the  _ fucking _ expert on that now--”

“That’s quite enough, Kristen,” Fabian interrupts sharply. “We need to get some rest. Nothing else is going to be accomplished today.” 

Riz nods in agreement. “Come on, Kris, you can stay with me tonight if you need.” He fixes her with a gentle gaze and desperately fights the urge to look at Fabian. 

She shakes her head. “Nah, I’ll go home and regret my existence for a while, I think.” She casts something Riz once again has to assume is Messenger because Fig barks out a laugh soon after and then the three girls are off and Gorgug follows soon after, leaving Riz and Fabian alone in the parking lot. 

“So…” Riz begins, not quite knowing what to say. 

“I’m gonna go home,” he says quickly. “I have homework.” 

Riz raises an eyebrow at that but shrugs it off. “I’ll see you tomorrow then?” 

“Yeah.” 

They both stand there in awkward silence for a beat, and then Riz turns to Fabian and asks, “Can I hug you?” 

Fabian opens his mouth as if to say no, but instead shuts it and nods, pulling him into a tight hug. Honestly, Riz has no idea how long they hugged for--felt like some balance between eternity and a millisecond to him--but he knows that when they break apart, Fabian’s blushing a little bit and it makes Riz turn a little bit red too. 

“I’m glad you’re okay,” Fabian murmurs. “I really don’t know what I’d do without you, the Ball.” 

Riz laughs weakly. “Play a shitty game of Bloodrush, probably.” 

He huffs and rolls his eyes good-naturedly. “I’ll see you at school. Goodbye, Riz.” 

“Bye, Fabian.” 

It’s only after Riz gets home and collapses on the couch that he realizes he’s never really heard Fabian call him Riz before. 

And it’s another hour after that when he realizes he kind of loved it. 

**Author's Note:**

> i hope you liked it! i thrive on comments and kudos and friendship
> 
> hit me up on tumblr (@mydicegotcursed) and feel free to message me to talk about anything you're feeling, have a good day!


End file.
